


Be Here

by returntosaturn



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Apologies, Coming of Age, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, One Shot, Season 3 coda, Will introspection, short and sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-15
Updated: 2020-09-15
Packaged: 2021-03-06 18:34:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26483494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/returntosaturn/pseuds/returntosaturn
Summary: "I'm sorry. About... what I said. That day."// Mike tries to mend things before the Byers' leave. Season 3 coda.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 8





	Be Here

**Author's Note:**

> I found this in my WIPs, and I just decided to post it because why not? It seems important. Its a moment we didn't really see, but probably definitely happened.

Early fall sun is warm on their hair, their wet faces, the empty yard. El and Max giggle and cry, their arms tight around each other’s necks, swaying in the bright afternoon glow.

Jonathan has his fingers in Nancy’s hair.

His mom stands by the door of the U-Haul, hiding her face in her hands.

Will tries to hold back a sob over Lucas’s shoulder.

“We’ll miss you, dude,” he says and squeezes. “Try not to forget us.”

“Not a chance,” he manages, wiping at his eyes when Lucas lets go.

Mike’s blue shirt swims in his vision, an amorphous blob, and Will feels panic in his chest. He’s avoided this. 

“I…” he hears Mike start, and when he finally gets the nerve to look up at him, the boy who’d been his best friend since Kindergarten, his first friend ever in his whole life, his eyes are big and full and sad under his thick dark fringe, staring down at the gravel. 

“I needed to tell you…” he tries again, lips parted like the words are there but he doesn’t want to say them yet.

Will presses his lips together, and reaches for him because if he doesn’t, he’ll probably collapse. Mike is there to catch him, steady him, hot palms pressed to the back of his shirt.

“I’m sorry,” Mike blubbers suddenly, all at once, setting his chin on his shoulder like he isn’t six inches taller. “About… what I said. That day.”

Will chokes. The sound he makes when he tries to swallow down a sob is pathetic and it makes him cling tighter. Mike does too.

“You’re awesome,” Mike goes on. “No matter what anyone says. You’re  _ so _ awesome…” 

Will clutches at the cotton of his polo shirt, knows he has to let go.

“No matter what. Exactly how you are…” Mike blunders through tears of his own, then pulls back and looks at him full on. His hands are firm on Will’s shoulders, even as they both wobble through tears. “You’re my  _ best _ friend.”

It’s jumbled, but it’s halfway there, and Will understands what he means, even if he can’t do anything but nod.

He thought it would be easier to just end it. Put a wall up since the events of summer, so he wouldn’t have to feel this now. So that maybe, just maybe, he could leave without having to confront it one last time. Act like it wasn’t part of him. Act like he didn’t think about it every day, worry about what it meant, what they’d think, why it happened to him. But of course it couldn’t be avoided. Refused to be ignored, like a dark vapor tugging the corners of his mind. The crack was opened, and it would not be closed.

He knew it was only a matter of time til he’d have to face it.

He was too big now to sit and wait and hide.

He isn’t sure—he doesn’t think he can never be sure at this point—but he can at least hope that his family, his friends—even Mike—will be there when he’s ready.

Even if they’re far away.


End file.
